Dream Seeds is a program designed primarily for grade six students across rural Victoria.

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Through extensive research and personal experiences, the MSRF Alumni recognised that a proportion of young rural Victorians are at a disadvantage, in terms of education, aspiration and participation. Dream Seeds aims to demonstrate to young people that they can be the leaders of their own lives no matter their circumstances. Engaging and original activities have been developed by the Alumni to ensure maximum participation and learning. These activities include personal development and teamwork tasks. The program is based on core themes of building Aspiration, Resilience and Connection in young people. MSRF Dream Seeders (facilitators) work together to present the workshop and engage students in challenging and thoughtful conversations and activities.

A pilot workshop of Dream Seeds was delivered to Creswick North Primary School which gained feedback beyond expectations. With the positive feedback the Alumni began contacting numerous schools across Victoria with which they had connections. After Creswick, Dream Seeds was delivered in Maryborough, Ballarat, Benalla, Wangaratta and Drouin. From the feedback received from these schools we decided to change some of the content and relate it more closely to the Victorian Curriculum.

The Dream Seeds® name has been registered and MSRF Dream Seeds creators and presenters are very proud of the unique materials they have created. The program involves some individual thought provoking tasks, some group activities and creative and physical elements. The feedback has been very positive.

WE LIKED:o Working as a team and group activitieso Getting to know more about each othero Learning more about ourselveso Talking about our feelingso Expressing themselves in a different wayo “Fun but educational”o Thinking about different qualities and valueso Share our qualities and nd more about other people’s qualitieso Talkingo How thoughtful, kind, caring and down to earth people are (the leaders)o Having the opportunity to think about their futures

“I liked how deeply it connected to all of us” “I could be myself...I don’t think it could be improved, it’s unique and special”

“I liked that we got to think about our futures” “It made me feel better about myself”

“I liked how it was fun but we also learnt something about ourselves”

“It was really fun how we did things about the community”

We will be taking Dream Seeds to the Wimmera, including Birchip and St Arnaud. Next year we plan to run the program throughout schools in Gippsland, the South West and the Mallee regions of rural Victoria. Along with these exciting plans we also aim to focus on finding funding for the program to ensure we can deliver the program to many more Year 6 students in rural Victoria.